BASKETBALL

BASKETBALL; Seton Hall Wonders After Loss To Syracuse

By RON DICKER

Published: February 11, 2001

SYRACUSE, Feb. 10—
Eddie Griffin of Seton Hall wondered aloud when the losing would end. His teammate Darius Lane sat at the other end of the locker room in the Carrier Dome tonight and asked what might have happened had he defended Allen Griffin even tighter as the Syracuse guard launched his game-winning shot.

The Pirates (12-9 over all, 3-7), who have lost four straight games, wrestled with more questions than answers. They solidified their status as a Big East also-ran with a 63-62 loss tonight, but turned in a spirited performance before 29,453 fans.

Moral victories will have to do for now. Afterward, no Seton Hall player dared mention the long-shot possibility of qualifying for a berth in the N.C.A.A. tournament. Lane said the goal now was to make the Big East tournament, which is open to all but the last-place finishers in the conference's East and West divisions.

''We've got to keep our head up,'' Lane said. ''If we keep playing like we played today, something good is going to come out of it.''

The Pirates were good tonight and they were poised. Then a difficult basket broke their hearts. It also broke Seton Hall's string of good fortune here. The Pirates had won their previous three games at one of college basketball's most difficult places for a visiting team to play.

Allen Griffin's jump shot from the baseline with seven seconds remaining gave the No. 9 Orangemen a 63-62 lead, and Damone Brown blocked a last-second 3-point attempt by Seton Hall's Desmond Herod to make the score stand up.

Unable to penetrate the Orangemen's zone, Eddie Griffin and Lane nearly shot the Hall to a fourth straight upset here.

Lane drilled six 3-pointers last February when Seton Hall upset the Orangemen, ranked No. 4 then, 69-67, to end Syracuse's 19-game winning streak.

Lane made six 3-pointers again tonight, scoring 20 points. Eddie Griffin added 18 points and 10 rebounds, showing no ill effects from the booing he received from Seton Hall fans in the team's previous game, a loss to Rutgers last Sunday at Continental Arena in East Rutherford, N.J.

Tonight, he was the target of a season-high Carrier Dome crowd which braved a wind chill of minus-30 degrees to attend. ''I'm used to getting booed on the road,'' he said.

Lane silenced nearly everyone when he banked in a 3-pointer from the top of the key to give Seton Hall a 62-60 lead with three minutes left. Seton Hall did not score again, undoing 37 minutes of its best basketball since it beat Syracuse on Jan. 21.

''It was a gut-wrenching game,'' Coach Tommy Amaker of Seton Hall said. ''This is a tough place to play. We've been fortunate in the past to come here and eke out wins.''

Benefiting from the Pirates' propensity to shoot a 3-pointer and retreat, Syracuse (19-4, 7-3 Big East) outrebounded Seton Hall by 49-31 and limited it to 36.8 percent shooting. The Pirates made 11 of 32 3-point attempts while making token attempts to get the ball in close. That resulted in just three free throws for Hall in the game.

Preston Shumpert led Syracuse with 16 points and 13 rebounds. Brown had 15 points and 16 rebounds, but he should have had one more personal foul, according to Herod. Behind by 63-62 after Allen Griffin's jump shot, Herod took a pass from Andre Barrett (11 points) beyond the arc near the baseline and threw up a shot. Brown swooped in to bat it away.

Playing its first game of the season unranked, Seton Hall committed just four turnovers to Syracuse's 14. ''Tonight we were sloppy,'' Syracuse Coach Jim Boeheim said. ''We gave them every reason to believe they were going to win, and we took it away from them.''

When Lane hit his fourth 3-pointer to give Seton Hall a 54-46 lead with under 11 minutes to go, it looked as if the Pirates would be able to gun their way to victory. Then Syracuse made its run. Jeremy McNeil's 3-point attempt got a favorable bounce and touched off a 10-0 spurt.

After a free throw by Allen Griffin with 2:55 to play, Syracuse trailed, 62-61. The score stayed there after Ty Shine missed a runner that went out of bounds with 20.2 seconds to go.

Allen Griffin had the ball and shook Barrett off a screen. Then Griffin pushed to his right toward the baseline and was picked up by Lane. Griffin launched a feathery 8-footer over Lane that fell through the net.

''I keep thinking about that shot,'' Lane said. ''If I could have just played a little better defense.''